Baby Shoes

Yesterday I cleaned out Tommy's "shoe bucket," a long-overdue task.  I was tired of pulling out shoe after shoe, only to find that nearly every shoe I tried was too small for Tommy's rapidly growing feet.  Plus, the bucket was overflowing because I kept throwing in the new bigger shoes without removing the older, too-small shoes.  I am usually very orderly when it comes to out-grown items: clothes, toys or otherwise.  When things no longer have a use I either pack them away until they might become useful again, or I send them packing to a new home where they can find use with someone else. 

But I have been avoiding this shoe-clean-out like the plague.  Having had all my 8+ and 9+ pound boys born with huge feet, and seeing only one of them walk before the age of one, most of our "baby" shoes, the boys' first real walking shoes (slippers and Robeez not included), were in sizes to fit a 12 to 18-month old.  And that is the size that Tommy has left behind.  Which means all the sweet little hand-me-down shoes, the ones that have strong baby memories attached to them, are now either destined for the garbage or the Goodwill.  I've saved a pair of the first soft-soled shoes for each of the boys in their baby boxes, but I can't keep these too.  As much as I hate to let these shoes go, there is no reason to have pairs and pairs of tiny, unused shoes collecting dust around the house just because I am a sentimental sap and don't want to send them on to other babies' feet...just yet...or ever...so I must.

Instead of keeping the shoes, I will keep this picture:

(L to R, Top to Bottom) Zac's first pair of shoes: the box accidentally had two different sizes, but I didn't really notice for at least a month, he loved to unvelcro the straps and cross them into X's; Josh's first pair of shoes: he wore Zac's at first, but was too good at getting them off because of the easy-to-undo Velcro, so I bought these with laces that he couldn't get undone in hopes of having his feet stay in his shoes for more than 20 seconds; Ben's second pair of shoes: he was the only one with smallish feet and the only one to really be fully walking before a year, so his first pair are tiny and in his baby box; Zac's second pair of shoes: baby Vans I found at Nordstrom Rack, my sister loved her little sk-8-er dude nephew in these ones; Luke's first pair of shoes: the toes are rubbed raw because he walked and crawled in combination for so long; Josh's second pair of shoes: easier to get on than laces, tighter Velcro, just like the big-brothers' shoes as he so desperately wanted them to be; Luke's first pair of church shoes: with such little feet, Luke needed a smaller pair than what we had for Josh, I loved how these looked with his little khaki pants and Papa hat!

It's a photograph of so much more than a bunch of broken-in shoes.  It's a photograph of unsteady steps along the sidewalk to the park, of chasing seagulls at the beach in winter, of a first day in nursery, of running--because walking is for babies, and I'm no baby--everywhere, of keeping up as best as possible with big brothers, of crunching fallen leaves along the nature trail, of kicking first soccer balls with Dad, of moments spent putting them on or taking them off before the next adventure that would take us out of the house, of 10-month-old steps taken through long grass towards Dad seen for the first time after a month apart, of little shoed-feet sticking out from under the stroller canopy, of huge flying leaps from playground equipment, of an ultimate decision to {finally} walk instead of crawl, of emptying out sand after a visit to the sandbox, of pacing church hallways during sacrament meeting, of stomping on ants on the patio, of jumping in puddles on a rainy day. 

It is a picture of so much more than a bunch of broken-in shoes.  It is a picture of a thousand memories that are sacred to me.  Thankfully the memories can remain long after the shoes have moved on.